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“Look who made drink money for karaoke tonight,” she said.
“I knew that was going to happen,” I said, shaking my head at them as I put the guns back. “You should get out of here before they follow you out,” I added.
They were long gone when the guys came out a few minutes later. All the cockiness was gone, their shoulders were slumped, and their heads ducked.
It was the perfect time to talk them into classes and yearly memberships. Because guys like these ones didn’t like being shown up by women. So now they were going to bust their asses to get better.
They wouldn’t.
At least not better than Kit.
Some shit was just a natural gift, and couldn’t be taught.
Once they were gone, Amos made his way out, a smirk on his face.
“The purple-haired one…” he said, coming up to the counter.
“My sister,” I explained.
“Makes sense. She’s impressive.”
“Yeah, she is,” I agreed.
“Brunette could hold her own,” he added. “But she was better at the con.”
“She’s a professional gambler,” I explained.
“Lemme guess. The guys will be back.”
“For classes and memberships.”
“Good. Want this place to succeed,” he said. “Not a lotta places that will pay me to read most of the day,” he said, waving his finished book. “Gonna go grab a different one,” he said, heading out toward his car.
When he was coming back, I was pulling down the flat listing.
“Baby girl gonna be living with you?” he asked.
“In my backyard,” I clarified.
“Good,” he said, nodding. “Safe.”
And with that, he was gone, leaving me to wonder what the fuck kind of history Amos had.
His paperwork had shown a history of the military, then a couple of bouncer jobs.
There had been a few other applicants with actual range jobs, but I’d liked Amos’s vibe better.
Calm, kind of quiet, but I got the feeling he was seeing everything, even when he didn’t seem to be paying attention.
I had a feeling he was seeing even more than he let on most of the time.
I didn’t stop at the club on the way home, and I tried to tell myself it was because I had a sink problem to deal with. And not because I wanted to see if Lana had settled in yet.
Her car was parked in the driveway as I parked, then made my way up the front path.
I almost stepped on it.
A plate full of chocolate chip cookies.
There was a smile on my face as I bent to pick them up, then bring them inside with me.
It looked like Lana had not only settled in, but had time to bake.
Sure, cookies were common when you had a new neighbor, but usually it was the current residents who gave them to the new one, not the other way around. I figured it maybe was related to how she wanted to mow the lawn or do housework. Like it was her way of trying to make up for what she thought was a one-sided deal.
Pulling off the cling wrap, I grabbed one of the cookies, and took a bite, sighing a bit as it all but melted in my mouth.
I’d had homemade cookies, of course. I had a mom and aunts and cousins.
But it was the first time someone who wasn’t related to me in some way had made me cookies. And they were fucking banging too. Dezi would pay her good money to be his personal cookie baker.
I glanced out the kitchen window into the backyard, seeing the chubby, lady pug named Ronald asleep a few feet from my house.
But then I spotted Lana, rocking on the chair on the porch, a baby pressed to her shoulder.
There was something inside then that I didn’t fully understand. A sort of “pull,” if you will. Like something in me was trying to get closer to that, to having that.
A woman, kids, hell, even the dog.
On her rocking chair, Lana smiled out toward the lawn, making my gaze move toward where two kids were kicking around a ball, big smiles on their faces.
When I looked back at Lana, she had the most serene fucking look on her face as she let out a deep sigh.
Fuck it.
The sink could wait.
I brewed a pot of coffee, then made two cups, moving out the back door.
The sound of the screen clapping against the frame had Lana’s head whipping over, worry furrowing her brow for a second before it relaxed again, and she gave me a soft smile.
“Thank you for the cookies,” I said, bringing over her mug of coffee, and setting it on the table beside the chair. “They’re the best I ever had, but you can’t tell my mom or aunts or cousins I said that,” I told her.
“Oh, don’t go putting my baking on a pedestal,” she said, rubbing the baby’s back. “I bought pre-made dough,” she admitted with a sly little smile. “I figure that the kids probably won’t remember if I added all the ingredients myself, just that there are fresh cookies baking every once in a while. I’m a decent cook, but I always mess up anything I bake from scratch,” she admitted.
